Spring 2012, Issue 23

Mills College’s $3.5 million def-icit hasn’t been completely closed, but President Alecia DeCoudreaux does not “anticipate additional lay-offs,” she said at last week’s com-munity meeting.

“The hard work of restructuring that we did in the fall is the work that was to be done and is all the work that we’re doing relative to restructuring,” DeCoudreaux said. “We said early on that we were go-ing to roll up our sleeves and do really hard work one time, that we didn’t want to keep coming at this over and over again.”

The GSB Gathering Hall ac-commodated a packed house dur-ing Wednesday’s lunch hour as students, faculty and staff consid-ered the administration’s budget and enrollment updates, along with a “mini course” in higher education finance.

“We’ve operated at a deficit for many, many years,” DeCoudreaux said, “but we can’t continue doing that. So we have to continue doing our work. That includes looking for additional ways to be efficient. It also includes looking for ways to increase our revenues. Obviously, we’re very tuition dependent, and therefore enrollment is one of the primary ways in which we increase our revenues.”

Students’ tuition dollars are the largest source of revenue for the College. The second is housing, according to Jamie Nickel, Interim Vice President for Finance. Togeth-er, tuition and housing account for 70 percent of the College’s revenue.

Nickel gave a basic rundown of the College’s $86.2 million oper-ating budget from 2010-2011. Be-cause of the enrollment dip between fiscal years 2011 and 2012, the bud-get has come up $3.2 million short in tuition and housing. Nickel also reported that the investment saw a crashed in 2009, and the value of the College’s endowments — an-other revenue source — dropped 33 percent.

The College has looked for ways to cut costs, like staff fur-loughs, faculty salary reductions and the December layoffs. The President’s Cabinet has also taken salary reductions and furloughs. Nickel added, “The president has given up her vacation.”

On the increasing revenue side, Vice Provost Andrew Workman shared the Enrollment Management Task Force’s work since September. With help from outside consultants,

the task force focuses on effectively coordinating all facets of enroll-ment across departments — “which for undergraduates is a multi-tiered process beginning not quite in the cradle but at least when students are (high school) sophomores, all the way through admissions, packag-ing for financial aid and when they actually come through the door in August,” Workman said.

An early accomplishment of this work was that the number of this spring’s incoming students beat enrollment projections for both the undergraduate and graduate levels — “the second largest ever for a spring class,” Workman said.

“Is there any thought for the En-rollment Management Task Force to consider attracting students who are full pay,” said Renee Jadush-lever, Vice President of Operations, “so that we don’t have to offer them a discount?”

Discount refers to the average amount of tuition the college pays per student in financial aid awards. Last spring, The Campanil reported that the College’s discount rate was 49.4 percent — “way above a lot of our peer groups,” Nickel said in March 2011. Students received a financial aid package covering al-most half of their tuition, but that also meant the College’s tuition revenue was halved.

At the April 11 community meeting, Workman said that there is an intense competition for stu-dents who don’t need financial aid: “There are relatively few of those students in that full-pay category.”

Full-pay students are not the so-lution to the College’s budget woes, according to Workman.

“But if you actually look at stu-dents who may not be full pay but have the means to pay a substantial proportion of that, we can actually do just fine with our financial mod-el,” he said.

Nickel said that full-pay stu-dents are not necessarily the best students, either.

“A student with high grades and high test scores doesn’t have to full-pay anywhere,” Nickel said. “They’re going to get (merit-based) financial aid offered to them.”

Meanwhile, every Mills com-munity member can help boost en-rollment through the simple act of being nice to visiting prospective students and their families.

Provost Sandra Greer reminded the community about the upcoming Monday’s Admitted Student Pre-view Day for First-Year Students.

“Smile,” Greer said amid audi-ence laughter. “Say hello. If they

VOLUME 97 ISSUE 23 www.thecampanil.com Tuesday | April 17, 2012

Find more stories, photos, videos and live updates at www.thecampanil.com

President anticipates no more layoffs

Student-curated art show

See Pages 4-5

Diana ArbasChief News editor

Above: President Alecia DeCoudreaux (left) said the first thing she and her Cabinet did to tackle the deficit was learn about higher education finance. Interim VP for Finance Jamie Nickel (left) gave the community a basic budget rundown. Below: The April 11 budget and enrollment meeting packed the house, drawing representatives from all campus constituents.

ALL PHOTOS BY CHANTELLE PANACKIA See BUDGET page 3

2 News


Lauren-Marie SliterEditor in Chief

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Debate over Mills’ medical marijuana use unresolved

Webmaster Ching Yu

Opinions Editor Michele Collender

While Oakland has become a hub for California’s medical mari-juana movement in recent years, Mills has only just begun facilitat-ing its use on campus.

The College implemented its first medical marijuana policy last year, which prohibited smoking marijuana on campus and made edibles, or cooking and eating marijuana in food, the only form of usage allowed. But the debate be-tween medical marijuana cardhold-ers who want to smoke on cam-pus and the rules of the institution is ongoing.

“[The policy] is about balanc-ing the needs of the community,” said Angela Batista, associate dean of community life. “Everyone has a right not to be affected by other’s decisions.”

As it stands now, residential students with medical marijuana prescriptions are required to regis-ter with the office of Services for Students with Disabilities (SSD) before moving onto campus. But in accordance with state laws that prohibit any drug use in schools, smoking it on campus is illegal even for registered students. If a residential student is caught smok-ing, the consequences may vary, but Batista said the punishments are not severe.

“This is not a punitive system,” Batista said, “it’s educational. Each incident is looked at case by case.”

Examples of some of the educa-tional consequences include writ-ing a reflective paper about the in-cident or designing an informative poster about medical marijuana to post somewhere on campus.

In the midst of this debate, some cardholding students feel that the policy is not taking their needs into consideration.

“[The policy] is frustrating be-cause the school caters to so many other things on campus like dogs and cigarette smokers,” said O, a cardholding student who asked that her last name not be included in this article. “But when it comes to taking our medication, there are all these restrictions.”

Another cardholding student, who wished to remain nameless, felt similarly.

“Mills has all these resources but isn’t providing us with what we need,” she said.

The anonymous student is a residential student who has been issued several warnings by Public Safety for the use of her medica-tion. The smell of marijuana, she said, is enough reason for a student to report another student to pub-lic safety, and is probable cause for public safety to search a dorm room for marijuana, or at least come knocking on the door asking to see a prescription card. But, she said, smelling of marijuana doesn’t necessarily mean that someone has been smoking inside. It can stick with a person long after they have smoked.

“It’s frustrating because I have to ‘prove my innocence’ every

time something like this happens,” she said.

Her most recent run-in with public safety was a few weeks ago when a student saw her roll-ing a joint, or marijuana cigarette, to smoke off campus, and reported her. She showed her card to public safety when they came to her door and resolved the situation, but she still felt “villainized.”

“This is supposed to be about creating a safe space to have medi-cation and Mills isn’t providing that,” she said.

The rules for nonresidential students with medical marijuana prescriptions are not so clearly de-fined. The student handbook only includes residential students in the policy, and, according to Ba-tista, commuter students are not re-quired to register with SSD. Unlike their residential peers, if a com-muter student is caught smoking on campus it could be considered misconduct, which would affect them academically.

But, like residential students, in-gesting marijuana through edibles is allowed.

O, who is a commuter student, uses medical marijuana to treat chronic pain and expressed dis-satisfaction with the idea of using edibles to treat her pain.

“Eating and inhaling are two completely different things,” she said.

For one, she said, it takes much longer for the effects of marijuana to kick in when you ingest it, and it is harder to gage how much of the substance you are taking in. Being allowed to smoke medical marijua-na on campus would help her treat the pain.

“There is not a moment of my day that I am not in pain,” O said. “It is just how well I am deal-ing with it. I don’t always know when I am going to have use my medication.”

Both O and the anonymous student felt that the solution to the problem was for Mills to create a designated smoking area for medi-cal marijuana cardholders.

According to Batista, that would not be so simple. The challenges with creating a designated area are both logistical and monetary, she said.

“How do we pay for it? Is it an open or closed space? How do we regulate who enters the space?” she asked hypothetically. “All of this isn’t just up to one per-son, either. It has to happen at an institutional level.”

The Associated Students of Mills College (ASMC) is currently in the process of implementing a smoke-reduction policy on campus, which would include campus-wide designated smoking areas and a fine for breaking the smoking rules. Though the ASMC board has voted to pass the policy, it still needs to be voted in at the institutional level. ASMC Vice President Rebecca Freeman said that though the word-ing of the proposed policy does not specify what falls under ‘smoking,’ she didn’t see why it wouldn’t in-clude marijuana. But both she and Batista said this prospect has not yet entered the discussion.

“The conversation around medi-cal marijuana is fairly new,” Batista said. “We are working hard to create a space where student suggestions are taken up with the institution, but we have a lot to overcome.”

Tessa LoveAsst. News editor

April 17, 2012

Bus Rapid Transit

The AC Transit Board of Directors will hold a pub-lic hearing on the 25th at the AC Transit General Of-fices to consider certifying the Final Environmental Impact Report (FEIR) and adopting a Locally Pre-ferred Alternative for the East Bay Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) project.

Native East Bay Gardens

The eighth annual Bringing Back the Natives Garden Tour takes place on May 6, offering 50 gardens for the public to stroll through to learn about the benefits of gardening with native plants. For information on how to participate, visit w w w. br i n g i n g b a c kt h e natives.net.

Oakland covered in trash

Illegal dumping has long been a problem in Oakland with its expansive industri-al areas that attract people who don’t want to pay land-fill fees. Officials are cur-rently working on several solutions, including a pro-gram to license indepen-dent haulers, which would help insure their legitimacy.

Oikos Memorial Fund

Oikos University has cre-ated a memorial fund for victims of the April 2 mass shooting in which seven people were killed and many more were in-jured. Proceeds will go to the victims families. To make a donation, visit the university’s website: oikosuniversity.org.

Cinco de Mayo

People from all over the Bay Area are invited to enjoy a free parade to celebrate Cinco de Mayo. The pa-rade will take place on May 6 from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. along International Boule-vard from 35th to Fruitvale, and will include authen-tic Mexican food, art and live entertainment.

Local news bites

SOURCE: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

The Wo/Men’s Alliance for Medical Marijuana established the nations first legal medical marijuana plant, lovingly named ‘Victoria,’ in Santa Cruz in 2009 after Bill 390 passed.

3News April 17, 2012


Meatless options at Founders promote health

Having long been committed to offering a variety of vegetarian and vegan options, Bon Appétit, Mills College’s food service provider, has recently implemented Meatless Mondays at Founders Commons and the Tea Shop.

Meatless Monday is an oppor-tunity for an individual to choose meatless or vegan options, while those who are already doing these things can help by spreading the word.

According to Jason Landau, Bon Appétit’s General Manager at Mills, all of the items served for lunch and dinner on the Global line at Founders will be vegetarian on Mondays, while Founders’ Classics line will continue to offer both veg-etarian and meat options.

“Personally, I think that I haven’t been eating meat too often lately,” said Mills sophomore Rose Sarinas-Wong. “I tend to stay more towards a vegetarian type diet, and I eat meat every once in a while to supplement my diet. But I think that Meatless Monday is a good plan for those who tend to stray towards heavier meats to help with health issues.”

While Bon Appétit has always served a variety of food, whether vegetarian, vegan, or with meat, the implementation of Meatless Mon-day has raised a new awareness in healthy eating.

“It’s really important to have a lot of options every day,” Landau said. “Meatless Monday began with the Humane Society to get (the movement) started in a lot of difference places which didn’t nec-essarily offer vegetarian and vegan options. We (Bon Appétit) offer those options every day.”

Other institutions, includ-ing colleges and food service providers, are jumping on the bandwagon and increasing their meatless options.

“The Meatless Monday cam-paign has mushroomed across the country in the last nine years,” said Kristie Middleton, Humane Soci-ety for the United States (HSUS) Outreach Manager. “It’s become so pervasive that the American Meat Institute did a survey and found that 50 percent of people have heard of Meatless Monday and another 18 percent are taking steps to reduce their meat consumption.”

Meatless Monday dates back to the early 20th century.

According to Josh Balk, a spokesperson for the HSUS, Meat-

less Monday was first introduced during World War I by the U.S. Food and Drug administration as a way for Americans to conserve re-sources during wartime. The move-ment was then brought back again by Presidents Roosevelt and Tru-man during World War II.

In 2003, following a slump in the movement, the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health re-launched Meatless Monday in an effort to promote sustainability, animal welfare and public health.

“Meatless Monday is now a multi-national campaign, with major metropolitan areas across the world implementing Meatless Monday,” Middleton said. “For example, in the United Kingdom, Paul McCartney supports what some call ‘meat-free Monday’.”

Bon Appétit, meanwhile, sup-ports meatless choices as part of the company’s philosophy.

“Every single Bon Appétit of-fers vegetarian entrees every day, not just on Mondays, and usually vegan ones as well,” said Bonnie Powell, Bon Appétit Company’s Director of Communications. “Through our Low Carbon Diet program, we have reduced our use of beef by 33 percent in 2007, the equivalent of meatless Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday morning.”

Since first being implemented in the early 1900s, people have chosen to participate in Meatless Monday as a way to preserve their health and save animals from need-less suffering.

Meat alternatives made of plant proteins have been created with the same taste and texture as real meat to encourage the participation of non-vegetarians.

At Mills, most of Bon Ap-pétit’s meatless items are stuffed vegetables, such as quinoa-stuffed portobello mushrooms, accord-ing to Landau. Founders also of-fers Morningstar Soy Sausage for breakfast each morning, as well as Morningstar Vegetarian Patties for their weekly Thursday BBQ on the Classics line.

Meanwhile, some individuals in the Meatless Monday movement find it more effective to increase vegetarian offerings rather than completely eliminate meat, eggs and dairy. Another option is to im-plement substitutes, such as replac-ing dairy milk with soy, almond or rice milk.

Furthermore, recent data from a Harvard University study found that replacing saturated fat-rich foods, such as meat and dairy, with foods that are rich in polyunsatu-rated fat, such as nuts and seeds, reduces the risk of heart disease by 19 percent.

According to Middleton, there have been a number of studies that link factory farms, establishments that raise high numbers of live-stock in a closely confined space to global warming. The United Nations has said that animal agri-culture is responsible for 18 per-cent of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions, which doesn’t in-clude the pollutants that take place as a result of run-off from animal waste lagoons.

On factory farms, the waste from animals goes into a pool. From there it’s removed by a truck and sprayed onto fields as fertiliz-er. At the rate that fields are being sprayed, the soil can’t take it all in, leading to run-off. During natural disasters, animal waste lagoons overflow and flood directly into water supplies, including lakes, streams, and rivers, which results in the pollution of water supplies for people and the massive killing of fish.

Meatless Monday helps combat such adverse conditions.

“I think Meatless Mondays are a great idea because the majority of the meat industry has devastat-ing effects on the environment,” said Mills sophomore Evan Kra-vette. “Having a day without meat is a good way for Mills to respect the Earth.”

In terms of environmental im-pact, the Environmental Defense Fund, an expert team of environ-mental advocates, has said that by cutting out even one meal of meat per week, it would be like taking 500,000 cars off of the road.

“All around, vegetarianism is better for your health and the en-vironment, the land,” Landau said.

In recent years, there has been a growing concern among activ-ists regarding sustainability and animal welfare.

“About 1.8 billion fewer ani-mals would suffer if everyone went meatless one day a week,” Balk said.

Although Meatless Monday has only been recently implemented at Mills, the feedback from other schools regarding the movement is mostly positive.

“Meatless Monday allows us to educate students about alternative lifestyles and that you don’t need meat to have a complete meal,” said Jennifer Le Barre, Oakland Unified School District’s Director of Nutri-tion Services. “The response has been great at Child Daycare Cen-ters where we serve our 2-5 year olds and at Elementary Schools. The students at middle and high schools don’t like the program, though, and participation decreases on those days. This, of course, is counter-productive to the purpose of the National School Lunch Pro-gram. Due to this, we stopped the program at high schools and are considering doing the same for middle schools.”

Despite high school students’ reluctance to partake in non-meat meals, the general consensus is that Meatless Monday is a moderate change that can do many people a lot of good.

In the end, though, it all comes down to money.

The alternatives to eating meat can be expensive, but Bon Appétit isn’t worried about the cost, as they already serve a variety of vegetar-ian and vegan options that depend on local vegetables from farms within 100 miles of Oakland, in-cluding Riverdog Farm, County Line Harvest, Coke Farm, Ratto Brothers, and Gizdich Farms. In addition, whenever the Mills gar-den has extra produce, Bon Appétit purchases the surplus.

Though implementing Meatless Monday will not decrease costs for Mills, Landau said saving money is secondary to serving great food.

According to Middleton, how-ever, the meat industry is concerned about losing profit if people recog-nize the adverse affects of eating meat and either reduce or cut meat completely from their diet.

While the meat industry has been successful at advertising their products, Middleton said the Meatless Monday campaign is a response that seeks to reverse the affects of such advertising.

Landau said he is hopeful for the future of Meatless Monday at Mills, and that it will continue at least through the rest of this year. Regardless of how long Meatless Monday lasts at Mills, though, Bon Appétit will always have vegetar-ian and vegan options.

“Meatless Monday is a tradi-tion that’s been long embedded in our society,” Middleton said. “Yet with today’s twist on it, we have an incredible opportunity to make a huge difference in a variety of areas just by our meal choices.”

Ruby WoodsBreaking news editor

Founders Commons offers a variety of vegetarian, vegan and gluten-free options to support Meatless Monday, and general healthy eating and evironmental choices.

CHANTELLE PANACKIA

look lost, take them to where they need to be.”

“You laugh,” Workman said to

those assembled, “but one of the things we found in this enrollment management work is that if parents and students don’t see people smil-ing, they think it’s an unfriendly campus and won’t come. So smile!”

In her closing remarks, De-Coudreaux echoed Greer and Workman.

“When we have students and families on campus on Monday or any other day,” DeCoudreaux

said, “they see us with smiles on our faces, looking like we’re happy to be here, they feel happy to be here. I’m hopeful that we feel like we want to smile on a regular ba-sis, but I’m asking you, that even

if you don’t quite have it in you on Monday, if you can find your way to make those bright smiles apparent to those who are visit-ing, that can certainly help us with our enrollment.”

From BUDGET page 1

4 Arts & FeaturesApril 17, 2012


FEMMESCAPES: AN EXHIBITION CURATED BY MILLS STUDENTS

Dr. Stephanie Hanor walks around the gallery space to make sure all the final touches are made .

Have you ever wandered through an art exhibition and noticed the subtle light-ing that illuminated the soft features of the painting or how the artwork is hung at the perfect eye level for viewing? Many viewers of the exhibition aren’t keen on the small details that go into making an art exhibition successful. Often times, these nuances within a museum or gallery can heighten your experience or make the whole show unremarkable.

Museum Studies WorkshopOffered every spring semester at Mills

College, it is an upper division class that takes on a curatorial project. The class en-titled, Museum Studies Workshop, is led by Dr. Stephanie Hanor, director of Mills College Art Museum (MCAM). Hanor guides the class through all the aspects of making the project a reality. This year the class consists of five undergradu-ates: Paige Azarakhsh, Rachel Levinson, Bridget Stagnitto, Anna Vanderslice, and myself included; two graduate MFA stu-dents: Keegan Luttrell and Jenny Sharaf.

Lenore Pereira and Rich Niles’ Private Collection

The Museum Studies Workshop was given an opportunity to curate an exhibi-tion from Lenore Pereira’s and Rich Niles’ private collection focused on contempo-rary female artists. The class split up into teams and came up with three strong pro-posals that elucidated the curatorial narra-tive of each concept and made a working checklist of the works of art that would be exhibited. With the difficult decision to chose the exhibition theme proposed by the groups left up to Lenore and Rich, they sought some outside counsel from their friends at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA). After, a week they decided that the themes of Femmes-capes strongly encompassed an interest-ing aspect of their collection they wished to explore.

FemmescapesWhile brainstorming ideas with the cu-

ratorial team, “Femmescapes” was a neol-ogism, a newly coined word, shouted out by Jenny Sharaf, first-year graduate stu-dent, which was agreed upon unanimous-ly by the team for its succinct appeal. The neologism amalgamated the two main

entities and encapsulated the sweeping contextual spectrum of the works within the show.

The exhibition includes varied works by the female artists, which explores the relationship between women and the en-vironment. Exploring the literal and figu-rative notions of the relation between the female and the environment, there is a wide spectrum of work that exhibits the intersection of the two entities. The mal-leability of environment and women inte-grates and re-interprets gender ideals and engages a deeper dialogue for the visitors.

Curatorial Experience As a member of the class and curatorial

team, I found the experience to be enlight-ening. The balance of theory and practice in the class was engaging mentally and physically. We learned how to release a proper press release, publicize the event, and strategize with the generous help of Maysoun Wazwaz, MCAM’s program manager. Stacie Daniels, MCAM’s man-ager of collections and exhibitions was there to aid in the technical necessities of the show, which included a lot of drilling and measuring. Without the great resourc-es provided by Dr. Hanor and MCAM, I’m not sure if Femmescapes would have been possible.

Through the learning process of put-ting a show together, we not only took part in the analytical process of exhibit but the physical aspect of the exhibition. Accom-panying the exhibition is a catalogue that includes an essay and artists’ entries from each member of the class.

Installation of the artwork was one of the most dynamic aspects of putting the exhibition together due to the varied mediums of the works. The exhibition in-cludes everything from Jeanne Dunning’s video installations to Sarah Sze’s deli-cate sculpture hanging high in a corner to Amalia Pica’s Sorry for the Metaphors 3, which was compiled Xeroxed sheets that were wallpapered to create a 14 feet high tiling installation on the wall. The hands-on experience of actually installing the pieces was surreal.

Everything went fairly smoothly thanks to the teamwork put in by the team and Niles, who took on a very active role with the installation process and went above and beyond to help put the show together. With the exhibition finalized we wait excitedly and nervously for the pub-lic to see the wonders of Femmescapes.

Joann PakArts & Features Editor Femmescapes

An exhibition featuring work from the collection of Lenore

Pereira and Rich Niles cu-rated by students in the Mills College Museum

Studies Workshop.

Exhibition Dates:

Saturday & SundaysApril 15-May 6, 2012

11 a.m. - 5 p.m.Location:70 South Park

San Francisco, CA94107

Featuring:Approximately 40 works in-cluding painting, video, pho-tography, sculpture, and works on paper, Femmescapes presents work by Louise Bourgeois, An-drea Bowers, Jeanne Dunning, Ann Hamilton, Mary Daniel Hobson, Nina Katchadourian, Lisa Kokin, Lynda Lester-Slack, Ann Mandelbaum, Ana Mend-ieta, Marilyn Minter, Shirin Neshat, Chikako Okada, Mar-lo Pascual, Amalia Pica, Liza Ryan, Kiki Seror, Kiki Smith, Oriane Stender, Sarah Sze, Nic-ola Tyson, Sue Williams, and

Francesca Woodman.

5Arts & Features April 17, 2012


FEMMESCAPES: AN EXHIBITION CURATED BY MILLS STUDENTS

ALL PHOTOS BY JOANN PAK

Top: Andrea Bowers’ delicate piece Political Slo-gans and Flower Magick: No Hanger, 2006. Below: A look at Marilyn Minter’s sensuous Crisco, 2003.

Above: Sternly rested on a plinth is Kiki Smith’s Untitled (Head with Coin), 1998. Below: Greeting visitors is Louise Bourgeois’ Remembering, 1999.

Anna Vanderslice, member of the curatorial team puts up Amalia Pica’s Sorry for the Metaphor, 2010.

6 April 17, 2012


Opinions & Editorial

DateMySchool exclusive for all

On this Friday the 13, what do you hope doesn’t happen to you?

“I hope that I don’t die at Adam Lowdermilk’s recital.”

—Moni Gbadebo,second year graduate student

COMPILED BY MICHELE COLLENDER & BRIDGET STAGNITTO

Q U E S T I O N O F T H E W E E K

“I hope I’m not quoted in public.”

—Ralph Lewis,third year graduate student

“I hope I don’t fall asleep in class.”

—Rachel Quimby,sophomore

“I hope I don’t hear anything from the M Center today.”

—Grace Osborne,senior

“I hope a piano doesn’t fall out of the sky.”

— Dave Lu,second-year graduate student

“I hope I don’t forget to do my taxes.”

—Chrissy Donovan,first-year graduate student

Elizabeth RicoCopy Editor

STAFF EDITORIAL

On April 10, as part of South Asian Middle Eastern Asian Pa-cific Islander (SAMEAPI) Aware-ness Now!, the Muslim Student Alliance hosted a panel about the Arab Spring, the wave of revolu-tionary uprisings in the Arab world beginning in 2010. Guest speakers included Laila El-Sissi, author of Out of Alexandria, Fred Lawson, professor and department head of government at Mills, and Wanjiru Kamau-Rutenberg, assistant profes-sor of politics at the University of San Francisco.

Panelists discussed the move-ments happening in the Middle East, the necessary steps for the transition to democracy to occur and the larger implications surrounding the violent events in Syria.

The evening began with a brief look at the developments in Egypt. Although the people of Egypt over-threw the president, the government never actually changed. The country was turned over to the Armed Forc-es of Egypt and progress was slow.

While the people were protesting in the streets, a dark entity was ris-ing in the background.

“We were not paying attention to who was planting the flag,” said El-Sissi. out of context - what does this mean? at the april 10 event?

With the president out of power, the Muslim Brotherhood moved in and used religion to buy votes. This plan worked and the Brotherhood took 72% of the vote under the pre-tense of saving souls.

Once the Muslim Brotherhood took control of parliament they im-mediately began shaping a constitu-tion to control citizens. These new laws were focused largely on con-stricting women’s rights.

Many of the new laws were cre-ated by a woman who was a member of the Brotherhood. She proposed laws that would give men the right to rape women, beat their wives and children, and marry another woman without their wife’s permission.

Everything was rushed and left citizens struggling to understand the

changes that were being made. For-tunately, the Supreme Court ruled the constitution invalid.

It’s going to take many years be-fore any positive change in Egypt will occur. The movement is far from over. Like Rome, democracy cannot be built in a day.

The next hurdle Egyptians face is monetary.

“In three months there will be no monies in Egypt,” El-Sissi said at the April 10 event. Only time will tell how this new problem will be addressed.

In 2002, Kenya peacefully voted President Moi out of office after 24 years of running the country, but ran into some of the same problems Egypt faced.

Once the president was out of power there was no one left to keep the new government in check. If the fundamental institutions that caused the problems are not broken up, said Rutenberg, then the people are not truly liberated. A new constitution with a system of checks and balanc-es must be written, otherwise noth-ing will change.

According to Lawson, what sets Syria apart is the government’s ex-cessive use of force to deal with protesters from the very begin-ning of the uprising. There was no gradual shift from police to military; the Syrian regime sent in its combat army first.

Although Syria survived the global economic crisis of 2008, the country could not avoid the people’s frustration with the government’s corruption. On March 15, 2011 a “Day of Dignity” protest was held in Damascus demanding the release of political prisoners. What began as a peaceful demonstration quickly spiraled out of control.

Despite the regime’s efforts to squash protesters, the people only became more resolute when they discovered footage of 13-year-old Hamaz al-Khateeb being tortured by security services on April 28, 2011.

By the end of July 2011 soldiers began to defect and aid the opposi-tion by providing them with fire power. The government then re-sponded with unconstrained force. The regime’s reasoning behind this was that concessions prompted higher and higher demands, and the opposition would never be happy.

To make matters worse the oppo-sition is split and has no clear lead-ership, has no safe base and no large scale labor movement to support it.

There is currently a cease fire in effect which was brokered by Unit-ed Nations Spokesman Kofi Annan. However the regime has not with-drawn troops. It is important to note that up until the deadline, the regime violently attacked the opposition and even killed those trying to cross the border to safety.

Syria’s fate stands upon the edge of a knife, stray but a little and all hope for peace is lost.

Civil war in Syria has global consequences, which is why world leaders are scrambling to come up with a solution fast.

One of the underlying forces be-hind the civil unrest in Syria is the severe lack of water. According to the U.S. National Oceanic and At-mospheric Administration (NOAA) the Middle East is losing water at an alarming rate. If a full scale war breaks out, remaining water sources will be taxed beyond their limits raising a terrifying question: What happens when the water runs out?

Another reason we should be concerned about Syria is because it is the core of the Middle East. If it falls into conflict, there is a chance that violence will spill over into neighboring countries, putting countless lives at risk.

Other factors to consider are oil prices, terrorist strong holds in the area such as Al-Qaeda and the economy.

By looking at the larger global urge that spurred movements like the Arab Springs and Occupy Wall Street, we can help Syria’s transition to democracy.

In order to help Syria, we need to explore three questions that Ruten-berg finds critical:

-Is demilitarization possible?-How will democracy be domesticated?

-How will pro-democracies deal with the question of the other?Once these questions are an-

swered, the path to democracy becomes a little easier for Syria to walk.

We should not, and cannot ig-nore what is happening around us. What happens in Syria will impact us. It’s a small world after all.

A new way for college students to date is online and boasts safety, selectivity, and exclusivity. The site DateMySchool allows undergradu-ate students, graduate students, fac-ulty, and alumnae to sign up. The only way to sign up is by using an edu address. This is supposed to make the site more exclusive from “creepers” (who are they?) and people who haven’t gone to college (dumb people?).

However, alumni can also be a part of the site, which doesn’t really narrow down the dating pool too much except to a group of people who have at one time been associ-

ated with a school. You do get to choose who can see you and who you can choose from, their age, de-partment, etc.

The site also says you get to choose the circle from which you find a possible date. This could be fitting for Mills where some of us are looking to date from outside the small, private community of mostly women. This site could connect you with beauties from local schools like UC Berkeley and San Francisco State.

While they claim to want to ex-pand their LGBT user-base their video does little to be inclusive. The

video, which is on the home page of their site, features only a girl search-ing for a guy.

And although it claims to “keep the creepers out”, there are creepers at every school, that’s just a part of life. So giving the user a sense of security that may be false is even more sketchy than using a site like OkCupid. In fact the only difference between the two is the edu require-ment. Just remember to always stay aware that you can’t rely on oth-ers for your safety and that dating someone in college doesn’t mean a “safer” date. Sexual assault happens at colleges by students too.

Arab spring and global uprisings

“I don’t want it to rain.”

—Mathilda Moore,senior

“I hope I don’t lose my game of words with friends.”

—Seth Boyles,first year graduate student

7April 17, 2012


Health & SportsDo this, not that: tips for healthy

living and feeling better

Sleeping in or oversleeping, though no matter how satisfying it sounds, can lead to serious health risks. Think again before you decide to hit the snooze button (or ignore it all together!).

SOURCE; FLIKR

Eden SugayHealtH & SportS editor

Meatless menu suggestionsAlheli CuencaAsst. HealtH & SportS editor

The school year is winding down and the hurricane of finals is kick-ing into high gear. The one thing in our lives that continues to take hits during such high pressure times is sleep.

Finding the right balance for sleep is difficult and an ongoing process: We either sleep too much or sleep too little. It’s always been said that the ideal length of sleep we should get per night is eight hours. A good night’s sleep is essential to producing good health. However, new and ongoing research suggests that sleeping too much is linked to a number of medical problems, in-cluding diabetes, heart disease and a shortened life span.

Research and reports show that sleep deprivation has the potential to double your chances of dying due to cardiovascular problems.

The same shows for oversleep-ing, which more than doubles the aforementioned risk. Health com-plications may also be born from oversleeping, which includes: dia-betes, obesity, headaches, back pain, depression and an untimely death.

Professor Francesco Cappuccio from the Warwick Medical School in England along with researchers from the University of Warwick and the University College London gathered data on 10,308 people on this case.

The recommended amount of sleep for an adult person is eight hours per night, and sleeping less is risky. In Cappuccio’s research project, data regarding his subjects’ sleeping habits was collected be-tween the years 1985-88 and 1992-93, then in 2004 when their mortal-ity rates were checked.

Other factors like age, body mass index (BMI), smoking habits

and physical condition were also considered. Results showed that the mortality rate of people whose length of sleeping decreased from eight hours a night in the years 1985-88 to five hours a night or less was 1.7 times higher than the mortality rate of the people who had continued sleeping the recom-mended eight hours per night. The most common cause of death in people who held these sleep rou-tines was cardiovascular problems.

Additionally, the same research-ers found that sleeping more than eight hours a night was equally as bad. The mortality rate doubled for subjects who increased the amount of time they spent sleep-ing from eight hours. The Warwick research project produced a con-nection between mortality rates and our sleeping habits, but has not defined the direct cause of death in oversleeping.

The amount of sleep necessary to produce good health will vary significantly over the course of your life. Depending on your age and the kind of activity you engage in, in addition to your health and life-style, your sleep will change.

Oversleeping, or hypersomnia, is a medical disorder. Hypersom-nia causes people to feel consis-tent sleepiness throughout the day, which leads them to have several, intermittent naps and for unusu-ally long periods of time (day or night). Those who suffer from hy-persomnia also experience the same symptoms born from anxi-ety, low energy levels and poor memory due to their constant need for sleep.

Naturally, not everyone who oversleeps has a sleeping disor-der (some people just love sleep-ing!). Other causes of oversleep-ing include the use of an external substance, such as alcohol and prescription medications. Medical conditions, such as depression, also

cause people to oversleepIf you average more than seven

or eight hours of sleep per night, see a doctor for a checkup to determine if you have a disorder or not.

If your oversleeping is caused by alcohol or certain prescription medications, cutting back on the use of these substances will help.

There’s nothing wrong with hav-ing a good cup of coffee or glass of wine every once in a while. The key with both alcohol and caf-feine, however, is moderation and timing. Going easy on the fat-tier foods also contributes to better sleeping habits.

While a regular bedtime is rec-ommended by most sleep profes-sionals the regularity of a routine sleep pattern can be a very power-ful behavioral sleep aid. It isn’t easy to maintain such rigid routines. No matter when you decide to go to go to bed, give yourself about an hour to wind down.

Gentle yoga and breathing ex-ercises before bed are great. In-dulging in some light reading or a little television will also help foster good sleeping habits, especially if you avoid anything too action filled or upsetting.

Your bedroom atmosphere counts for a lot in terms of getting you to bed faster and waking you earlier. The darker the bedroom, the better for maintaining crucial melatonin levels.

The light from your alarm clock needs to go, too. It is suggested to face it away from you, since when you can’t sleep all you do is look at the clock. As a result, you make calculations about how much sleep you’ll be getting (or won’t be get-ting) before you have to get up again causing more stress and wast-ing more time.

Similarly, if your oversleeping is caused by an underlying medi-cal condition, treating this disorder may allow you to return to normal.

Vegetarian dishes can be as simple as you need them to be. Try some of these delicious suggestions.

For breakfast:

- Fruit smoothie - Oatmeal with dairy-free milk and fruit - Cereal with dairy-free milk - Bagel with peanut butter or dairy-free cream cheese - Soy yogurt with fruit - Pancakes with maple syrup and fresh berries

For lunch:

- Veggie burger and fries - Sloppy joes made with meatless crumbles - Hummus wrap with diced vegetables - Vegetable soup with sourdough bread - Pasta with marinara sauce and vegetarian meatballs - Mock turkey sandwich and chips

For dinner:

- Grilled veggie and tofu fajitas - Burritos with grilled veg-etables and black beans or mealess crumbles - Vegetable and tofu stir-fry over rice

- Veggie chili with orn bread - Pizza with soy chese and meatless pepperoni - Lentil soup with salad and garlic bread

Recipe: Candle 79’s Paella

This is a great dish for a nice-weekend afternoon with your friends. Enjoy the rich flavors of this meatless adaptation of this Valencian dish of the east coast of Spain. This recipe serves 6.

Ingredients:2 ears of fresh corn

1 1/4 teaspoons of olive oil

3 tablespoons of olive oil

1/2 pound of oyster mushrooms, stemmed and chopped Sea salt and freshly grounded pepper

1/2 cup of chopped white onion

2 cloves of garlic, thinly sliced

2 red bell peppers, stemmed, seed-ed, and chopped

1/2 green bell pepper, stemmed, seeded, and chopped

1 1/4 teaspoons of smoked paprika

1 cup of chopped cauliflower florets

1 cup of chopped tomatoes

3 to 4 cups of vegetable broth

2 cups of Arborio or Valencia rice

1 cup of meatless sausage, cut di-agonally into 1-inch pieces

1/2 cup of chopped green onions, white and green parts Lemon wedg-es, for garnish

Directions:

1. Using tongs, hold the corn over a gas flame and cook it, turning, until nicely charred. When cool enough to handle, cut the kernels off the cobs and set aside.

2. Soak the saffron in 1 cup of hot water. Set aside.

3. Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a large sauté pan over medium heat and sauté mushrooms, adding salt and pepper to taste, for 5 minutes. Remove from heat, transfer to large bowl, and set aside.

4. Using the same pan, heat an-other tablespoon of olive oil. Add the onion, garlic, red and green bell peppers, and 1 teaspoon of smoked paprika and cook over medium heat until just tender for about 3 minutes. Add reserved corn, cau-liflower, and tomatoes. Cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and add to mushrooms.

5. Heat vegetable stock in a sauce-pan and let simmer. Heat the re-maining tablespoon of olive oil over medium heat in large soup pot. Add rice and stir until well coated, for about 30 seconds. Add the re-served saffron water and cook, stir-ring, until it has absorbed it all. Rice should be tender, not mushy, and retain its bite.

6. To get the socarrat (caramelized crust on the rice), uncover pan and increase heat to high. Cook until rice crackles and smells toasty, be-ing careful not to burn it. Add re-served vegetables and sausage, and stir. Cook over medium heat, scrap-ing bottom of pot so rice doesn’t stick, for about 3 minutes.

7. Remove pan from heat and cover with a kitchen towl for 10 min-utes. Taste and adjust seasoning, if necessary.

8. Sprinkle paella with remaining 1/4 teaspoon of smoked paprika and green onions. Garnish with lemon wedges and serve.

8 Health & SportsApr 17, 2012


BRIDGET STAGNITTO

Weekly fitness tip: The Mummy Kick

Sophomore Jenn Nguyen stands ready to begin the Mummy Kick warm up exercise. She is standing upright, with her legs shoulder width apart and her arms relaxed at her sides.

Nguyen then raises her arms up to the height of her chest, placing her palms so they face the floor. Stay planted in the starting position until the next movement of the sequence.

Nyugen takes her right arm and cross-es over her left, making an “x” shape with her arms. While making this mo-tion, kick your respective leg forward (right arm crosses, right leg kicks).

Nyugen continues the exercise by al-ternating each side’s arm and leg movement. Increase the difficult by increasing speed! Also, remember to keep your arms and legs straight!

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Spring 2012, Issue 23